From 2000 to 2014, worldwide clothing production doubled. This trend has continued to accelerate, with a 21 percent increase in production from 2016 to 2019, as globalization, internet usage and social media have come to dominate consumer behavior. Meanwhile, people are wearing garments for only half as long as they did at the beginning of the century. With new fashion trends emerging at faster rates and consumers looking for cheap alternatives to keep up, fast fashion retailers have stepped in to meet demand. These retailers, such as Boohoo, Zara and Revolve, emphasize making fashion trends quickly and cheaply available to consumers, primarily through their online platforms.

This past fall, I was diagnosed with an eating disorder — specifically, a restrictive form of anorexia. This became a label, one that began to be all I thought about. I seemed to spend every spare moment agonizing over my caloric intake and obsessing over how many miles I would run at the gym that day.

As both an affiliated student at Dartmouth and as a waste diversion intern with the Sustainability Office, I have experienced first-hand the divide that exists between sustainability and Greek life. It is nearly impossible to disregard the staggering amount of plastic cups and Keystone Light cans littered among Greek house basements — yet many students don’t blink an eye before tossing another can onto the pile. In the 2018-19 academic year, 65 percent of Dartmouth’s student population was affiliated with the Greek system. Greek life can no longer keep secluded from the environmental issues that affect every student on campus.

Two weekends ago, I eagerly gathered my snowboard, snow pants and puffy parka and boarded the shuttle bus to the Dartmouth Skiway to participate in my first-ever snowboarding class. Upon reaching the Skiway, I noticed the barren mountains, void of the fluffy white blanket of snow that would normally be present this time of year. What’s more, as soon as we began moving around outside, we began to sweat with almost no level of physical exertion. It was the middle of January in New Hampshire — and yet, we were sweating.

In 2014, Youtuber Gary Turk released a video entitled “Look Up,” a spoken word film intended for the technological generation. The video quickly went viral due to a hard-hitting message about technology and loss of human connection, but has since waned in importance. Dartmouth has recently had its own “Look Up” campaign, founded by Susan Reynolds, a Dartmouth ’84. Deemed “LookUp.Live,” the campaign has a goal of “creating innovative solutions for tech-life balance.”

“You have an eating disorder.” The words lingered in the air with exceptional weight, yet my mind refused to let them sink in. My eyes floated around the small examination room, desperately trying to distract myself from my diagnosis.